Friday, 29 January 2016

As an event, Shiny Shabby is quite unique - drawing together some top designers who offer a diverse and interesting assortment of things to suit a wide variety of tastes.

There is often a Boho eclecticism to the collection that suits me to a T, and I'm always excited when a new round starts. There's also the fact that each round doesn't always have the same designers participating and it's possible to see what is new, talented and interesting around the grid here.

These are some fashion looks that I've put together from just this current January round :

Tuesday, 26 January 2016

BambiChicque is the the Official Blogger Manager of the Medieval Fantasy Grid Crier and works tirelessly to promote the MFGC and to challenge MFGC bloggers creatively.

This is the first time that I've involved myself in such an enterprise - despite having had my blog for several years, I've never really got into the social media aspect of having a blog as much.

I do think it's good to have new challenges in a new year and this will be one of them!

●▬▬▬▬▬● - ̗̀ SOME RULES ̖́- ●▬▬▬▬▬●

♥ Theme: It's A Fantasy New Year" ♥

♥ No modern/fashion items or clothing or theme.

♥ Must be roleplay, medieval, elven, dwarfin, angelic or anything related to "fantasy"!

♥ Must utilize something from MFGC Designer's

furniture, decor, housing, dwellings, home & garden, etc.

(Not just set out a plant or candle).

♥ Must utilize something from MFGC Designer's clothing,

wardrobes, accessories, skins, tattoos, etc..

♥♥ Remember, you can always set up, take photos and rez at Dandelion Daydreams Factory if you don't have a place for yourself. Contact them for rez rights. (This is our MFGC Headquarters sim)

♥♥ This challenge is also a welcome to any other person who loves to blog, photograph and post in flickr. Anyone may join the challenge. But the gallery will be available to only our MFGC Blog Team.

If you fancy having a go why not give it a shot?

I like my images to speak for themselves so I try not to be too rambly about them.

Noble Creations who are part of the MFGC has designed the beautiful bath which I have transformed into a ship for my Dolly's adventures. They are also responsible for the deer chair and antique table/chair sets

Blue Moon Enterprises designed the rather handsome Fit Mesh costume attire my Male Dolly (Mr McDreamy) is wearing in " Live Extraordinary". It fits surprisingly well and this is a boon as it's not easy to find clothes to fit my Male COCO Doll

Other credits are as follows :

In "Live Extraordinary"

Props

From Noble creations (part of MFGC)

[NC] - Sacred Bathtub GOLD

[NC] - War Ground Standard (For the Secret Affair till 29th Jan)

From Shiny Shabby

Pewpew! Carton Tales 1 - Woof "Not Happy"

From Blue Moon Enterprises (part of MFGC)

BME Mouse King Outfit - This is fitted mesh and fits relatively well over COCO Male Doll.

BME Holiday Nutcracker Collection (Packaging)

Naminoke MARIN BUNNY B #5

{anc} garden. oldbook4Li

Birdy - [Alchemy] Story Book - Pigaroo - Pink

Birdy - [Alchemy] Story Book - Grumpkin - brown

Tabloid & Ma Vie.- Shaka Brah Surfboard - Shark Attack! (Rare)

dust bunny . life ring

Freebies on MP

Treasure Chest by Lora Lemon (Free)

//P.O.R\\ Thin Rapier (Sheath) (Free)

In "Drink Tea!"

The new stuff here is

Cheshire Cat Dress & Shoes by Remarkable Oblivion for Epiphany Gacha (I threw lots of money at this machine because the dresses and shoes are just wonderfully detailed and at $75L a pop, honestly a bargain.)

Signage " Down the Rabbit Hole" and " Mad Hatter Tea Party" from Boudoir. Boudoir have made quite a few lovely Alice in Wonderland Props and I thought these were just perfect for my ideas.

Alot of Vintage Arcade Stuff including some place settings and chairs from

Handverk Mad Tea Party Gacha and various other bits and pieces that I have hoarded and collected over the years.

My Doll Head is Gacha too (Julia in Milk by Genesis Labs) - I've always thought that her frozen smile was a little creepy and never quite used it in making images .. till now. I think it's perfect here for being quite Cheshire catty!

For any other details that you may wish to know but are not listed here, please feel free to ask! I'll be happy to elaborate with more information if you need it!

Saturday, 23 January 2016

I'm quite eclectic in my image making process and this is constantly influenced by the creations of others in my virtual adventures .

There's a sort of definitive aesthetic to classical fantasy images ala. dungeons and dragons. No doubt this had a large influence in my own approach in staging this shoot.

Together we can bring the storm II

I love that transmutable nature of SL. One day vampire, next day warrior princess!
Noble Creations (part of MFGC https://medievalsl.wordpress.com/) is the main inspiration for my classical Fantasy image today and this gorgeous gorgeous shoulder dragon from Katatonic (Just sized up!)
The New Stuff :
From Noble Creations @ Secret Affair - Amazon Warrior Crown (Ends 29th Jan)
In Noble Creations Main Store : Pauldrons and Cape (sized for both M&F) as well as these Thief Boots (They are Unisex not rigged so you can resize them via inbuilt script )Calico Hair makes some great hair that has this fantastical element to it and this one is 'Febe' from Hairlogy
I'm using poses from An Lar poses. Both "Simpli III" and "Honour" Series are from Shiny Shabby.

For Full details of WL, Outfit and Pose - See Screen Capture.

I thought I would also show you how I transform my original takes in SL and give them more drama.

The original screen shot for " Together we can bring the storm I"
I plan to increase the contrast in these pictures so when I take them,
I take them dark but light the models for contrast
This is most illustrated in the model's arm.
You can see I have set up two light sources (front and back)
in order to create this outline of light.
For light reflections to work well in SL you must have advanced lighting on.

The original screen shot for " Together we can bring the storm II"I created this set using " Welsh rock and cliffs" set from Fanatik and surrounding the base with {anc} mist Heavenly BlueI also set this up at about 1000m from ground in SL to achieve this horizon line effect

My own photograph of storm clouds above my own house ;-)
While it will be too innumerable to discuss what type of techniques I employed exactly in this little blog,
the main technique I use in Photoshop is layering.
To create more drama in my images,
I have layered over the storm clouds onto my images in order to achieve the end results.

Other details of note :

I'm using the corset part from a B@R outfit I also used in my steampunk dolly shoot taken long before I became a Genre designer myself!

The Axe is from an outfit by Poet's Heart called Barbaric. Unfortunately you're not able to see in these shots that it actually has a very ornate bear shaped handle.

The arm wraps are a gacha prize I won from an FGC round by DPD.

As always, I'm happy to help out with any other info you need regarding anything you see in my images and would like to know more about.

Friday, 22 January 2016

It's a pleasure to be able to showcase some of the things that are out in Shiny Shabby this round because they are crafted with such skill! I find them very inspiring in my own image making and I hope you will too! Or if image making isn't your bag, then just for the pure pleasure of dressing up your own persona!

I really like this item from May Tolsen's Tentacio for this round called "Black Duchaness" - it is a three piece accessory consisting of veil, crown and roses.

Also I think the new Elysium skin " Rosie" by Aleida Rhode is worth a mention for its beautiful detailing and naturalistic tones. I love the shape of the brows which I think really adds to the character of the model.

Finally there's this amazing rigged Vampire backlace by dM! which is available to buy in store Here! (yes I've looked it up for you and this SURL should take you straight to it!) :

Tuesday, 19 January 2016

I was listening to this track from "Fair Children" by OTT called The Bicycle Of The Sky and it seems as appropriately eclectic as the images I ended up creating.

Technicals :

I haven't captured the light settings on these as I was playing around with them so much I forgot to do so before I disassembled the set but I did capture the style notes as follows :

Model Style Notes

Credits :

I've been meaning to use these fabulous robots I got in a round of gacha called "The Gathering". They're from Kalopsia and I didn't realise just how fabulous they were till rezzed!

Lyrical B!zzare is an amazing designer that really does just get better and better with her technical skills in creating these intriguing fashions. My inventory list reads likes an evolution of style from her brand. She's also incredibly generous as these fashions are full perms - meaning you can remix them as you like and even resell them if you wish.

In these images my modelling doll is wearing :

New Stuff:

Amacci Hair - Serena (Longer Bangs) <- I love that Amacci has some really vibrant colours in their colour packs.

Also wearing The Mesh Project hands in their off the shelf form (TMD offers their basic Mesh body for free so you can try it out.) They come with the revolving bands around them that sign " Please use style mode to begin"

It's all about the drag for upcoming Genre this 15th Jan (2016).
I like participating in this event on occasion as a designer rather than blogger but nonetheless it is something I feel rather passionately for.
I like that Genre tries to come up with interesting themes that push ideas and boundaries and this is one of the edgier ones on " Drag Queens". In hindsight I really wish I'd taken up the challenge and come up with something (crazy eyelashes or earrings I think would have been what I'd have gone for if I'd thought about it longer), seeing all the lovely things that other people have done for it! I'm sure this round promises to be very entertaining as well as vibrant and interesting! Meanwhile, here's a sneaky peaky at what dM! have made :

Paris, Le Grande

"!dM "Paris La Grande" is deviousMind's contribution to Genre's "Drag Queens" round in January 2016, as per usual to a reduced price [the event runs until February 12th 2016].

Each set contains 3 boa styles, front and backwards draped (as seen in the single color images) and a wrapped version that runs down the left arm (as seen in the color pack image). And of course they were created with the aspiring dance diva in mind... Each boa consists of of one size fitted mesh, and additional flexi feather add-ons to bring more liveliness to the styling.

"Paris La Grande" also comes in 12 different colors of peacock feathers: **ONYX**, **BLACK PEACOCK**, **ORANGE**, **CANARY**, **RED**, **PINK**, **PURPLE**, **BLUE**, **ICE PEACOCK**, **KIWI**, **SNOW PEACOCK**, **NATURAL PEACOCK**, and a **COLOR PACK** if you just want to have them all.

Here's what I did with mine :

Dolly in Drag part I
"I don't want to go to heaven. None of my friends will be there"

Dolly in Drag part II
"You don't love someone for their looks, or their clothes, or for their fancy car;
but because they sing a song only you can hear"

Dolly in Drag part III
"This suspense is terrible... I hope it will last!"

Somehow I feel that I was rather channelling Oscar Wilde as I was styling my dolly. I got the body first much early on in my COCO dolly collecting pursuits oddly enough. I only got the face for this particular shoot. Think I might call him Derek McDreamy (Gray's Anatomy harhar)

Always happy to provide any additional information you may need that is not published here otherwise :

Props

Petite Mort - Rich Persian Rug (Mesh)

{anc} MoonLightLounge. ashtray stand* Cig used in pose comes from this dispenser

Sway's Cookie Bear [Candy] Rainbow (rez me) RARE

Kalopsia - Regency Settee - Black

-tres blah- Hodgepodge - Paper Pile

-tb- Vanity - Platter of Treasures

-tb- Vanity - Compact RARE

dust bunny . rose table . blue

ISPACHI [EMERSON] Foot Stool

[Con.] & :CP: Dragonfly Garden Chocolates

erratic / home - triple sec

Doll

CoCO BJD Male Body + 002B (Light) Head and Eyes (Blue)

Lelutka Kornelia Lashes .03 (Adjusted to fit)

Dura Hair Boys&Girls 24 Strawberry

Drag

!dM deviousMind "Paris La Grande" Blue Peacock boa (Parts F)

Mandala Lustful Bracelet & Ring

Ricielli (Non rigged) Leather Spiked Boots & Hot Pants

ieQED chanel pearl harness in black

{anc} cigarette

~Libertine~ Kitch Fan (I think this might be one given out by the furniture- not certain but it's a lovely detailed prop)

[Kunst] Brandy glass (empty)

Pose

!Bang - recline poses (1)M (This has been adjusted in a few ways for each of the images)

Thursday, 14 January 2016

A favourite theme I often play around with is dance and ballet in particular. I love how graceful and ethereal the ballet can seem - expressive in movement. I try to capture this in the composition and pose.

Danse

Danse - Outfit & Prop details (Click image to view larger)

Danse - Windlight Settings (Click image to view larger)

Danse Out-take (Click image to view larger)

Dead Dollz - The Rehearsal Collection

Just coincidentally, Dead Dollz who created the Sheriak dress I have used in the image "Danse" have done a fabulous gacha that is entirely ballet related - (Still)out at Shiny Shabby (but not for much longer! New round starts 20th)